People Are Very Confused By This Chinese Apartment Building With Fake Windows

Do you notice anything strange about this building in
Qingdao, Shandong province? The building, recently
completed, houses low-cost apartments created by the government.

Here's a clue. Look at the "windows":

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Yes, earlier this month, Chinese Internet users noticed that a
number of the windows on the building were not actually windows —
they had been painted on. What could be behind the decision to
include fake windows on a government-funded building filled with
low-cost apartments? Netizens wondered if the government had been
cutting corners, or scammed by a building contractor.

ChinaFotoPress /
Getty

Now, according to People's Daily, the
government has come forward to explain — the painted windows
are for purely aesthetic reasons. Apparently, the
fake windows are on an area of the building that houses a
staircase where it would have been impractical to have real
windows, the government said.

Still, locals have to wonder if painting on the fake windows was
really worth it. Qingdao's local government later posted a
message to their Weibo account saying that they had asked the
contractors to remove the fake windows, explaining that they had created
an "adverse social effect."